But HOW DID IT GET FROM HIS MACHINE TO YOURS? That's the ONE question you haven't answered.

EDIT: I watched the video, but what it shows is how to install from a recovery partition on an already existing system. That recovery partition appeared for the first time in Lion. So if you have a recovery partition from which to boot, then you have Lion (or later) already installed. But if the machine has Snow Leopard on it, there is no recovery partition. Either way, the video shows how to install from a downloaded version of Lion. What I think is most confusing is your use of the term "redeem." If you have an Apple ID, and if you purchased Lion on your Apple ID, and if you have access to the Internet and the Apple store (which the process in the video requires), then what is the redeem that your friend had to do? You should have been able to download Lion directly to your machine on your Apple ID.

And what the video doesn't show is that at the end of install you need to reboot. Have you tried holding down the option key as it shows at the beginning and selecting the other partition (not the recovery partition)?

It's not a physical item. Yes, it was his machine, but he used MY account. It is a virtual file. once, again, it is a VIRTUAL file. I'm pretty sure it can be used more than once. Lion was added to MY ACCOUNT. I was able to start the installation without a DISC or a USB stick. It's done all online.

Power OFF the Mac. Power it on, holding the Option key down and keep it down until you get the option for which drive from which to boot. Select the one that should be labeled "Macintosh HD" and NOT Recovery Partition. Report back here how that goes. If you followed that process on the video, the Macintosh HD partition has Lion installed. (In fact, if you HAVE a recovery partition you already HAD Lion, but that's another story.) Let us know what happens with the process.

Then Lion is NOT installed. Boot from the Recovery partition, run Disk Utility and format the internal drive. Make sure it's formatted for Mac OS Extended Journaled and GUID Partition Table. Then install and choose that drive to install to. The download of LION will take a while, I seem to recall it was 3 or 4 GB, and then it will install. You'll need to connect to the internet and provide your AppleID when it calls for it.

BTW, I never heard the term Virtual File. I have no idea what that means. But from the video and the fact that you have a recovery partition, at one time Lion or better was installed on the machine so you can do a network install like the video. It's going to take a while to download, so you'll need to be patient.

Well, I tried to reinstall again, and it was looking pretty good. The progress bar got full, but then the timer restarted, and I had to wait another hour or so. It just finished a few minutes ago, and once again all I see is the OS X utilities window. I tried to restart it and boot Macintosh HD, but it wasn't there. I just don't know what I'm doing wrong.

At this point your best bet is to call Apple Support. I am surprised how quickly you are back with this report as the Lion install typically takes a couple of hours to complete. Something is not right in your download. Since you just bought Lion, they should help you install it.

Totally confusing showing how to install Lion on a machine with Lion already on it. You need to download Lion again from the App Store and burn it to a USB thumb drive before running the Installer. Then you can boot from the thumb drive, hold down 'C' after rebooting and the thumb drive connected.erase and format the drive and do a clean install. Lion OSXDiskMaker will show you how to make the thumb drive.

Hang on to those original install discs like grim death! Using OS X.7 or later make a bootable USB thumb drive before running Installer!

Let me ask the question a different way. You said your friend "redeemed" this code for you on your account. At that point the install file was on HIS machine. How did you get the install file to YOUR machine? USB, DVD, whatever?

You said: if that's so, then how are you using your Apple ID? How did you get an Apple ID? And was did you mean when you said, "I'm only using my apple account?"

Been a long time lurker, but had to chime in on this one. I can't believe you guys don't understand how he's installing it without having an install disc or USB boot stick. He boots from the recovery partition, obviously Lion was previously on it or it wouldn't have a Lion recovery partition.

He then chooses to install Lion, enters his Apple ID/pass, Apple recognizes that he has purchased Lion and then proceeds to download the Lion installer and tries to install Lion, which seems to fail for some reason.

My guess would be a bad/failing hard drive, or a hard drive that needs to be booted from something like DiskWarrior to check for errors that simply erasing the Lion partition isn't fixing, or he needs to get a bootable Lion USB Recovery stick so he can totally repartition the drive to wipe both the recovery and main partition.

We quite understand how he's installing Lion from a recovery partition. I personally am trying to understand why, if he already has Lion, as seen by the Lion recovery partition, he has to 'buy' Lion from Apple again to install.
If he had Lion on there legally before all he needs is an Apple ID to reinstall. No need to 'redeem' or buy Lion again.
And I agree about the possible failing drive. Probably needs to be replaced.

Craig Domingue
(\__/)
(='.'=) This is Bunny. Copy and paste Bunny into your
(")_(") signature to help him gain world domination

In addition to what Craig said, the OP threw in that he "redeemed" some code by having his friend log in with his AppleID. If he had access to Internet and a Recovery partition from which to boot, he didn't need to have anybody "redeem" anything for him. And if you read the thread from top to bottom, he didn't disclose the fact that he didn't have access to the App Store until post #13. And then, as Craig said, the video he said he was following and said seemed to work REQUIRES App Store access, again confusing the issue. Did he or did he NOT have access to the App Store?

For 99% of installations, you either download the installer directly to the drive, or if you have to use a separate machine, you download the installer and then copy it to either a DVD or USB memory stick. We were struggling with how he got the installer from the store to his machine if he didn't have access to the App Store and wasn't using USB or DVD. I don't know if the HD failed or not, but from the symptoms the partition for OSX was not being created. If he called Apple support, they can talk him through it step-by-step on the phone. They might even be able to take over his machine remotely from the Recovery Partition and install it for him. (Never tried that, but it might work.)